The Smartest Guys in the Room Audiobook By Bethany McLean, Peter Elkind cover art

The Smartest Guys in the Room

The Amazing Rise and Scandalous Fall of Enron

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The Smartest Guys in the Room

By: Bethany McLean, Peter Elkind
Narrated by: Dennis Boutsikaris
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Brought to you by Penguin.

What went wrong with American business at the end of the 20th century?

Until the spring of 2001, Enron epitomized the triumph of the New Economy. Feared by rivals, worshipped by investors, Enron seemingly could do no wrong. Its profits rose every year; its stock price surged ever upward; its leaders were hailed as visionaries.

Then a young Fortune writer, Bethany McLean, wrote an article posing a simple question - how, exactly, does Enron make its money?

Within a year Enron was facing humiliation and bankruptcy, the largest in US history, which caused Americans to lose faith in a system that rewarded top insiders with millions of dollars, while small investors lost everything. It was revealed that Enron was a company whose business was an illusion, an illusion that Wall Street was willing to accept even though they knew what the real truth was. This book - fully updated for the paperback - tells the extraordinary story of Enron's fall.

© Bethany McLean, Peter Elkind 2003 (P) Penguin Audio 2021

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Critic reviews

...the most comprehensive picture yet of how the company went off the rails. The sheer accumulation of detail makes it possible for the first time to understand how Enron got away with its blend of hubris and incompetence for so long. . . This is more than a business story. It is also about what can happen to any institution when weak and complacent leadership allows itself to be swept along by strong vested interests and the mood of the times.
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This was an enjoyable listen, about the things a large company and its accomplices can do to fool the market about its actual state of business. While what Enron did was exceedingly complex, the writers made it understandable (you may want to know a few accounting terms such as balance sheet, equity and profit and loss). The tale of Enron's misdeeds is truly staggering, but at the same time business misdeeds are more difficult to pin down to individual miscreants than individual fraud, assault and similar felonies.

Enron gave us all (and especially its auditor, Arthur Andersen) some important lessons, but as with many such disasters those lessons tend to be forgotten over time. Legislation that was passed to prevent such events occurring in the future continues to be weakened by the legislature and by courts. The Global Financial Crisis of 2008 showed just how short memories can be when it comes to making money. We cannot seem to legislate our way out of a boom/bust economic cycle.

Regardless, this is a useful and informative tale of hubris, overselling, and fraudulent behaviour.

Complex tale, told simply

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A very enjoyable story explaining the collapse of Enron. A failure if controls across the board. Those who were
Everyone was prepared to look the other - as long as there was money to be made.

An excellent summary of a complicated collapse

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There are missing chapters towards the end of this recording, so it didn’t match with actual wording of the book.

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